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ESSENTIAL INSIGHTS 12 Questions Every
Brand Must Answer
The secret to growth: Ask essential questions. Demand the smartest answers.
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The most successful brands continually seek strategic growth opportunities — among their customers, within their categories, and across the culture at large. They ask essential questions, and do what it takes to get the smartest possible answers.
Easier said than done. In a world growing more complex by the minute, uncovering both domestic and global actionable insights to create value and drive growth has never been more challenging. Where do you even begin?
For more than 15 years, we’ve helped some of the world’s most successful companies ask the right questions, reveal new and surprising opportunities, and stretch their brand potential. This checklist is designed to help you do the same — no matter your business.
Kelton Global is a consumer insights and brand strategy consultancy that helps businesses grow and thrive. We combine market research with creativity to help companies all over the world answer the question: what comes next?
In every area of your business — from innovation and product development to messaging and media planning — success depends on a deep understanding of the characteristics that define and categorize your customers.
Of course, your brand can’t only focus on the customers you’ve already won over. To grow, it’s essential that you identify untapped groups of consumers and any unexplored potential of your brand’s core competencies.
Who are my customers today?
Who will my customers be tomorrow?
Consumer Insights
DEMOGRAPHICS / PSYCHOGRAPHICS
How to answer and take action:• Customer Segmentation
• Persona Development
• Segmentation Activation
Products, services, experiences — you design them all with your customers in mind. But are you giving them what they really want or just what you think they want? By gaining a deep understanding of the needs, behaviors, and drivers/barriers that motivate consumers, you can prioritize areas of true opportunity.
To stand out from the crowd, your brand needs to identify the touch points along the customer journey where your brand can make the strongest connection — knowledge that will allow your brand to take advantage of functional and emotional equities that drive growth. Combine what you know about how your customers think with observations of what they actually do to uncover hidden needs (and ways to activate on them).
What do my customers actually want?
What does the ideal customer journey look like?
How to answer and take action:• Focus Groups
• Ethnographic Interviews
• Design Research
• Product/Service Development
How to answer and take action:• Experience Mapping
• CX Strategy
What are consumers’ core beliefs about your brand and its place among your category/competitors? By answering this, you’ll be better positioned to understand your brand’s strengths — as well as weaknesses that can be turned into growth opportunities.
The unspoken question every consumer asks is: Why should I choose your product or service over all the others? Your brand’s value proposition is the answer. It needs to compellingly prove your brand’s worth. If it doesn’t, you’re sacrificing consumer interest and trust.
How do customers view my brand?
Is my brand’s value proposition resonating?
How to answer and take action:• Attitude & Usage Studies
• Brand Health Tracking
How to answer and take action:• Focus Groups
• Attitude & Usage Studies
• Brand Positioning Research
• Value Prop Development
BRAND PERCEPTIONS
You hope your marketing campaigns and messaging are resonating. But how do you know? Ineffective marketing and communications strategies have the potential to waste enormous amounts of time and money. If you want to maximize growth, it pays to understand what campaigns and tactics really work.
Are my brand’s marketing and communications effective?
How to answer and take action:• Ad Tracking
• Focus Groups
• Message Development
• Communications Strategy
A comprehensive understanding of the marketplace is crucial in developing effective product, sales, and marketing strategies. What is the total size of your category? How large is your brand’s potential market share (both domestic and global)? In other words, you need to understand what your market share is today as well as the potential “size of the prize.”
Does your brand have full visibility of the competitive landscape? It’s easy enough to identify other companies you go head-to-head with, but which are truly taking the most business from you? How does your brand awareness stack up for aware vs. non-aware customers? And what about emerging challenger brands? Do you have your pulse on startups intent to topple you? Know your competitors so you can pursue ways to differentiate.
How big is my market?
Who are my key competitors? Emerging competitors?
Category & Competitive Analysis
How to answer and take action:• Sizing survey across
markets
How to answer and take action:• Competitive Landscape
Analysis
Your brand doesn’t exist in a vacuum. The culture you operate in, whether it’s local or global, is always changing — and that means consumers’ attitudes, behaviors, and beliefs are changing too. By keeping a pulse on these macro changes, you can better anticipate trends and capitalize on new opportunities (ones your competitors couldn’t see coming).
We’re living in a time when technology makes it possible for entrepreneurs to rethink nearly every industry from the group up, from consumer goods to cars to meat. To stay relevant, your brand must anticipate change and be ready to take advantage of new opportunities.
How will the broader cultural shifts shaping consumers’ lives affect my brand?
What looming trends could affect my brand?
Cultural Landscape
How to answer and take action:• Cultural Insights
• Strategic Foresight
How to answer and take action:• Cultural Insights
• Expert Interviews
• Emergent Opportunity Analysis
Printable Checklist:Does your brand have all the answers?
Category & Competitive
Analysis
BrandPerceptions
Consumer Insights
Cultural Landscape
How do customers view my brand?
How strong is my brand’s value proposition?
How effective are my brand’s marketing and communications efforts?
Who are my customers today?
Who will my customers be tomorrow?
What do my customers actually want?
What does the ideal customer journey look like?
How will the broader cultural shifts shaping consumers’ lives affect my brand?
What looming trends could affect my brand?
How big is my market?
Who are my key competitors?
Who are my emerging competitors?
We live and breathe this stuff. Find out how we can help your brand fill in the gaps to drive sustainable growth — both in the short term and long term. Get in touch:
keltonglobal.com
1.310.479.4040
Don’t have all the answers?
